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Thanksgiving weekend traditionally kicks off the holiday movie season. Here's a look at some of the other movies opening from now until Christmas. Dec. 2 "The Kid & I": An Arnold Schwarzenegger-type action hero actor (Tom Arnold, above) is rescued from obscurity, not by special election but by the opportunity to make a new movie with a spoiled-brat rich kid. "First Descent": Snowboard documentary. Order the jumbo Mountain Dew from the snack bar. Dec. 21 "Cheaper by the Dozen 2": Steve Martin and Bonnie Hunt reprise their roles as the beleaguered parents of 12, this time competing against a neighbor (Eugene Levy)

The term pimp has strutted a long way. At least in pop culture. Now that the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences has awarded rappers Three 6 Mafia the best song Oscar for "It's Hard Out Here for a Pimp" from the film "Hustle & Flow," the word has moved from street corners to the mainstream. The Memphis rap group was the first ever hip-hop act to perform at the Oscars. To many people, a pimp still represents a very serious and dangerous reality: men who abuse and denigrate women and children for money.

TODAY'S QUESTIONS TOPIC 1: Maurice Clarett will plead guilty. Any recommendations? Jimmy Greenfield: Do NOT fumble the soap in the shower. Phillip Thompson: Treat prison like the NFL and sue to get in earlier. Leo Ebersole: Sure: "The Shawshank Redemption," "Escape From Alcatraz" and Season 1 of "Prison Break." Brian Moore: Learn to run even faster than you did as a running back. Evil Super Computer: Slip me $100, and maybe, just maybe, the locks on Cell Block D will malfunction.

FRIDAY The Kills, at Double Door, 1572 N. Milwaukee Ave. $12. 773-489-3160. The bloom is off the garage-rock rose, but The Kills don't sound like they care. Written in an abandoned building in down-and-out Benton Harbor, the group's minimalist "No Wow" (RCA) chronicles dead-end roads, gas-station liaisons and 24-hour supermarket aisles cruised by lowlifes looking for action. Onstage, the female-male duo battle for supremacy with seething distortion, writhing vocals and sinister body language, though at the end of the night, the sexually tense debate usually remains unresolved.

Sports movies about underdogs battling and clawing from behind to make it to the big game are as familiar as the old gang on TV's Monday--excuse me, Sunday--Night Football. And "Gridiron Gang" is as formula-bound as they get, even though it's a movie taken from real life. "Gridiron Gang's" seeming prefab movie-inspirational plot--a group of colorful, rebellious young felons at a California juvenile detention camp molded into a winning team by their hard-driving probation officer/coach, Sean Porter (Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson)

"Hoodwinked"--which is the latest cartoon recycling of that oft-told fairy tale "Little Red Riding Hood"--may be a bit scrappy-looking, but it's also pretty funny at times. An animated feature pitched at the media-savvy, TV-sophisticated post-"Shrek" generation of kids (and their parents), it doesn't beguile or impress you as "Shrek" or the Pixar films do. But when it's cooking, it does make you laugh. It's a slightly slapdash computer-animated cartoon feature that takes the venerable "Riding Hood" and updates and reconfigures it into a sendup of police-procedural mysteries such as "Law and Order" or "NYPD Blue" while adopting (no kidding)

As Cadillac heads down the road, what kind of music is on the stereo? The GM luxury division's "Break Through" television ad campaign defibrillates viewers' hearts with Led Zeppelin's 1971 classic "Rock and Roll." Let's not kid ourselves--this ad campaign is aimed primarily at white boomers. Yet Cadillac's biggest fans are at the other end of pop culture's radio dial. According to a survey by San Francisco-based marketing analyst Lucian James, Cadillac became the most name-dropped brand in songs on Billboard's Top 20 chart in January 2004, overtaking Mercedes-Benz, which has long been hip-hop's symbol of bling-bling materialism.

"Percy Weasley" will be on hand for three Harry Potter-themed trips to Britain. "Live the Legend: From King Arthur to Harry Potter" has two tour dates: April 10-15 and June 20-25. Each begins with a medieval banquet hosted by Chris Rankin, the actor who plays Percy in the Harry Potter films. Also on tap are lunch at a pub resembling the Leaky Cauldron, visits to various filming sites--such as the Bodleian Library and Christ Church in Oxford--and a ride on the North York Moor Railway, a.k.a.

"Glee Live!" rumbled into a sold-out Rosemont Theatre with all the subtlety of a monster truck rally. Mixing high camp with an overdose of arena-rock bombast, Tuesday's concert, the first in a two-night stand, featured group performances by a dozen regulars from the popular FOX show, including student leads Lea Michele (Rachel) and Cory Monteith (Finn). For the uninitiated, the series, which concludes its first season on June 8, follows the lives of glee club members at fictional William McKinley High School as they navigate issues ranging from teen pregnancy to student-teacher crushes.

By Levi Buchanan. LEVI BUCHANAN IS A REDEYE SPECIAL CONTRIBUTOR | December 30, 2004

NFL Street 2, PS2/GC/XB PUBLISHER: Electronic Arts VISUALS: Entertaining animations. AUDIO: Mismatched rock/rap soundtrack. DIFFICULTY: Easy FUN FACTOR: Not enough updates for a sequel. RATING: 3 THUMBS UP Eleven months--that's how long ago Electronic Arts released the first NFL Street game, and it shows in this too-soon sequel. It's not that the game is buggy; it's solid, mostly because so little has been altered from its original, successful incarnation.